While the fallout from the material copied by former NSA
contractor Edward Snowden has caused debate to rage within the USA – with several
technology companies now signed up to a
movement to Reform Government Surveillance – all too much of the press in
the UK has covered the story as if it were an act of treachery by the deeply
subversive Guardian.
So while Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Facebook and others put their names to a campaign
that states “While the undersigned
companies understand that governments need to take action to protect their
citizens’ safety and security, we strongly believe that current laws and
practices need to be reformed”, much of the Fourth Estate in the UK has not
bothered. Until today.
The problem with the revelations about the behaviour of the
NSA, and of GCHQ in this country, was that the story refused to break out
beyond the Guardian and Observer, and that was in the most part
down to the visceral hatred of those titles’ role in exposing the scale of
phone hacking and the rest of what is more kindly referred to as “The Dark Arts”.
Thus the tendency towards a culture of press Omerta: even
the Guardian starting a media column,
and therefore talking about other titles, was enough to invoke the boiling rage
of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre in condemnation. It was just not
done to dump on your own kind. Fortunately, this tendency to Mafia-like closing
of ranks has been broken by Kevin Maguire at the Mirror.
“I
spy a culture of pandering to MI5” he observes, following up with “The culture of secrecy and deference
surrounding spy chiefs isn’t good for freedom or national security. Why do we
tolerate it?” and, more tellingly, “Not
one piece of evidence was given to prove fugitive US contractor Edward
Snowden’s whistleblowing endangered agents or the defence of the realm”.
Got it in one.
Maguire goes on to contrast the cringe-inducing appearance
of the security chiefs before the Intelligence and Security Committee, where
Andrew “Nosey” Parker and pals were allowed
to make a number of assertions unchallenged, and the later grilling of Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger, which
featured chair Keith Vaz pitching the McCarthy-style “do you love your country?” question.
Maguire concludes “The
case for a US-style First Amendment to protect free speech, and the rights of
journalists, never sounded greater. Intimidating journalists is a revived hobby
of the political class”. Barton Gellman, quoted
by the New York Times, concurs: “I am very happy to enjoy the protections of
American law and American political traditions in terms of investigative
journalism”.
Good to see the story starting to break out. And good for Kevin Maguire.
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